Regeneration
by TheValencia
Summary: While reconstructing a new Torchwood base, Jack's daughter discovers an encrypted file containing the entire destroyed records of the institute. One problem:they need the DNA of Ianto Jones. Will Valerie Keeper sacrifice her own marriage to return him?
1. Basement

"ALEX!"

Without a doubt, he knew he did not want to leave his bed. Whether or not there was any safety placing their winter duvet between him and his obviously murderous wife, Alex decided he'd rather take the risk. Growling the entire way up the basement steps, Valerie soon busted through the bedroom door to rip the covers off his nakedness. _So much for shielding my dignity, _he thought.

"Good morning, gorgeous lady. Like what you see?" Valerie gave him a look from hell before revealing an angry scratch up her torso. "Val," Alex stuttered sitting up, "What the hell happened?"

Moving to his side, she slowly peeled her shirt off before instructing him to dig out two ace wraps from their ever-growing first aid supply.

"I'll tell you what happened, you asshole, you left a weevil in the fucking basement again! Why, Alex, do you find it so damn hard to remind me of these things?" She flinched, slapping him rather roughly on the back of the head, as he gingerly tried to clean the wound with a wash cloth.

"I'm so sorry, babe. Your Dad was…busy…last night. I couldn't get into the holding cells. It was my only option." Finally securing her bandages, he helped direct her to bed. While she was use to the usual bland injuries from her rather remarkable job, it never got any better dealing with pain. However, after two years of married life, she found having Alex Keeper was as good of a coping mechanism as she could have. Placing an arm across her chest, he balanced himself on a crooked elbow. Valerie smiled briefly, the huffed a slow breath, revealing she was still completely pissed off.

"You cannot, cannot, cannot use our home as a holding cell. For anything. Ever. Okay?" Alex gave a Cheshire grin and agreed with a short kiss. Rolling over, he headed towards their joint bathroom. Perching herself up, Valerie felt the knobs of her spine crackle. She soon settled into making plans as to how to remove an adult sized alien from her suburban home and exactly how she was going to explain to her father the two hundred dollar upholstery bill he would be receiving for her carpet. While there was never a shortage of funding thanks to her parent, she did admit to taking advantage of his long-earned wealth. Upon that note, it reminded her to also discuss with Alex about adding on more health insurance or taking a vacation to Tuscany. She already knew which one would be chosen.

Returning from the shower, Alex began slipping on this work clothes. Valerie took the cue to get ready herself. Sliding out of her pajamas and into some jeans, she began rethinking Alex's explanation of their downstairs intruder.

"What exactly did you mean by Dad was busy?" Alex shook his head for a minute before blushing.

"Come on, Val. You know your Dad, he's got that flirty thing going with the guys…and gals…and well, anything else really." Allowing Alex to help her slide her arms through a thin sweater, she paused.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute. You're telling me because my father decided to use our office as his fuck pad, I was almost disemboweled in what I would like to think of as my future children's playroom slash_ our_ fuck pad?" Alex gave her a blank stare.

"You know, as my wife I have the right to say, you are incredibly disturbing, but also correct in this case. Don't be so hard on him, babe. He's a lonely guy. We've got each other, Gwen and Rhys have Anwen, allow your old man the occasional late nighter." Alex slowly hooked his fingers to the curve of Valerie's waist. Her head fell softly backwards, finding the crook she claimed as her own in his neck. Carefully avoiding her bandages, he cupped the base of her breasts. His clover green eyes gave her a wink, while their matching charcoal hair melted into one another with a backwards kiss. While her own eyes, the color of rust, explored new, unblemished places around their room to desecrate with a quickie, she felt the prickles of stretched, flayed skin on her side. Frustrated, she turned around.

"That's just it though, Alex. He is an old man. Old enough to know better. For all the lives he's lived, he still makes the same mistakes. I love him, Christ knows I do, but this is not acceptable. I'm giving him a call." Shuffling over to her cell, Alex tried to intercede, failing and receiving a sharp pinch to his chest. The dial tone steadily hummed, while Valerie realized she was unsure how angry she would appear to be. Finally, a click on the other end signaled an answer.

"There she is, my darling girl. Exactly where are you this morning? You're fashionably late days ended when you turned eighteen, you know."

"Jack Harkness, if you must know, your darling girl had to have her husband dress her this morning thanks to someone's midnight sexcapades." There was a long pause.

"Val, I know you have the being strange thing going for you, but what the hell does that mean, exactly?" Rubbing her temples, she sat down on the edge of the bed, winking at Alex as he put her boots on for her.

"It means Alex had to use our basement to hold a Weevil last night and when I went downstairs to get another tin of coffee…"

"Shit."

"Yeah. I'm wearing a corset of gauze right now. It got me from my pelvis to my chest." She heard Jack rustle some papers around on his desk, an obvious sign his attention was elsewhere.

"You know I'm sorry, sweetie, but Alex was more than welcome to swing by and drop off his capture."

"Yeah, well, maybe he wasn't entirely comfortable walking in to you bending over some twink on our conference table." Jack's soft chuckle instinctively made her own smile appear. Pulling back her long hair, she let out a tight sigh. Jack paused.

"Val, do you need the day off? Are you ok?" She wanted nothing more than to say yes, she needed the day off for several reasons. Since she began working at the revised Torchwood, everything from laundry to potty training the puppy had fallen behind. Jack's ageless features were a growing strain as she already felt older than him at the mere age of twenty four.

"No, Dad, I'm fine. Just give us some time to get some breakfast and we'll be in, Alex probably before me. I'm going to try and stop at the police station, beg Andy for access to some of the older Torchwood cases. We need hard copies." With the losses still piled from the long before HUB explosion, Valerie had placed herself in charge of archiving. Unfortunately, with most of the tangible evidence burned and buried, it had been less than productive work. She could feel Jack nod understandingly through the phone.

"Take your time, I'll see you in a bit. I am sorry, Valerie. I'll…try to be better in the future." Val felt her shoulders sink a little in guilt. Jack was, at least, trying.

"It's ok, Dad. Be in soon. Love you." She heard Alex shuffling through the car keys. Lying back, Valerie stared intently at her ceiling. At that moment, she would've given anything to be simply, blissfully, boringly normal.

"Ready to go, babe?" Alex shouted. Sitting up, slowly, she clutched her side. The pain allowed a moment of clarity. Wasn't there still a weevil still bleeding all over her floor?

"Alex, before we leave, you're getting rid of that goddamn alien."


	2. Necro

Valerie was not impressed with the security of the local police, considering she was able to quite easily walk in to their file room without disturbing the bustling lunch schedule of Cardiff's finest. Looking carefully at the yellowed stack of reports in her passenger seat, she cringed at carrying them down the stairs. One final huff, she broke free of her seat belt and got out of the SUV.

Slowly making her way towards what was seemingly an abandoned storage unit, she gave herself an internal high five for the fantastic disguise of the renovated Torchwood Hub. Entering the front "office," Valerie took a left at the coat rack, revealing the hidden panel of stairs leading downstairs. Walking down, she eyed the handiwork from the past few months. It was almost an exact replication of Jack's original structure, minus the dinosaur and a few desks. The framing was in place when she found it, but it took a bit more finesse borrowing the essentials from UNIT to finally put the finishing touches. Now that the paint had dried and the interior windows installed, all that was left was to refurbish their archives.

Looking around, it appeared Alex was in the medical theater, his thin frame bobbing up and down to blood samples and Elvis Costello. Valerie appreciated her husband's passion for work and his impressive moonwalk. Convincing Jack to hire Alex as their doctor took more than a bit of charm. He had always been untrusting of her childhood friend. However, after making it perfectly clear it was both or neither of them (and a bit of a thrashing from Gwen) he relented. Thinking of Gwen, it didn't appear her supervisor had made it in yet. As Valerie was about to take a seat at her computer monitor, she heard a pattering come from the metal balcony.

"You know, if you think you're getting away without me looking at your injury, you're insane." Jack yelled, flashing a hyena smile. Rolling her eyes, Valerie felt a sudden relief of not sharing her dad's enthusiasm for mornings. Dragging his eyebrow up into a dramatic arch, he motioned her into his office. He assisted her up the steps, noting the tight muscles of her stomach contracting with pain. She followed him through to his makeshift control room, noticing the freshly painted grey interior turned out nicer than expected. Jack shut the door and cleared a space off his desk for her to sit upon. She gave him a blank stare.

"Dad, you do realize I would have to remove my sweater for you to take a look?" Jack merely began adjusting his table lamp in an upwards angle, taking a clinical lighting to the situation.

"And you do realize if you refuse my request I will tell Alex you're back to taking birth control even though he seems to be under the impression you're trying for a kid?" Valerie's jaw unhinged itself, a sharp gasp of disbelief emitting from her throat. She shared a stabbing look at Jack.

"How the _hell _do you know that?" Slowly moving towards his daughter, his broad figure blocked the illumination, casting a skyscraper shadow.

"I scanned you last week when you weren't looking."

"Dad, fuck—"

"I just happened to see you popping pills. Curiosity killed the cat, and your progesterone levels were through the contraception roof. So, million dollar question, why haven't you told your husband, considering the effort being put into, well, you?" he smirked. However, his smile quickly ended as Valerie placed a smart smack against his face. The quiet burned the room. Father and daughter faced each other, both with the same inherited look of determined fury in their expressions. Stepping closer, Valerie closed the tension.

"Let me tell you something, Jack. Neither of us are exactly perfect beings so I except a little less judgment from someone who's either ran off or murdered any bloodline he's managed to produce. I love Alex Keeper, okay? I've known since I was five years old that I would marry him. I've known that. For all those years you weren't there for me, he was. That little, black haired boy from next door that you hated so bad for me to spend time with _chose_ me knowing exactly what kind of life he was stepping into. He adores me. He protects me. And when Mom died and I had nowhere to go, he offered me a home. And for all that, I want to have children with him; I want to give him babies, as many as he wants. Because he loves me. But I refuse, and listen close Dad, I refuse to have a child at this time. Torchwood is dangerous, but more than that, being your daughter is the closest thing to a death sentence my family has. I will not bury my child. I will not become Alice." Jack's faced paled in contempt. The mixture of guilt and damnation was difficult for Valerie to read. She immediately regretted dragging her half-sister's misfortunes into conversation, especially when realizing the drudges of other losses mentioning Stephen would pull to the surface. Finally, Jack's shoulders rolled back, his head clear and steadied.

"Fine, Val. That's fine. Still, if you don't let me check you out, I will suspend your field duties. And I will make Gwen and Alex cover your shifts. Oh, and I'll still tell Alex about your little secret." He was serious, and Val knew she deserved it. Nodding shortly, she tried peeling her smoke colored shirt over her head. Jack, taking charge once again of the energy of them room, gave her an authoritative nod and finished removing her top. Helping her remove the ace wraps, he lifted her onto his desk. She laid there, head turned away from her father. He clucked his tongue several times, barely allowing his fingers to make contact with the trio of angry red lines.

"You'll need stitches. Want me to put them in or Alex?" Valerie barely raised her head, her body language confessing her exhaustion. Jack took the hint and dug his first aid kit out from his closet. "Come on, Val gal, I need you to roll a bit more towards the light," Jack said as he bared the majority of her weight. Tilting her to the left, she suddenly gripped his arm with a grimace. He stopped.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. His aura was slowly returning, a soft smile swept his face.

"You sure you don't want Alex? I can numb you, but you might feel more comfortable with him."

"No, I'm fine so far, honestly. Just…I just want my Dad, please." Valerie tried to make that sound like an apology for her hurtful comments, and Jack accepted it. Giving her a quick shot in the middle of her side, he soon began threading her stitches. Her skin was thick, like his, but pale caramel in color. She resembled her mother in great features; the long noir hair, copper eyes, even the plump pout of a vixen. Jack questioned Valerie's relation for the majority of her life, keeping a distance from her childhood. But the day came of her high school graduation when he flew to New Orleans to see her dart across the stage and snap up her degree. He recognized her alluring attitude that made all living things within a mile go weak in the knees. He knew then, as she started her adult adventure, she was his child.

After a good thirty minutes, he snipped the line of his handy work, Valerie's side looking like a patched rag doll. She had nodded in and out of sleep for a better part of the procedure; finally admitting that she was less well than she appeared to be. Gently nudging her awake, he supported her frame into a sitting position and pulled the sweater back over her head.

"There we go, good as new. I'm gonna have Alex give you a round of antibiotics to be on the safe side. My little girl scout better just stick to paperwork for the next couple days, mkay? And for future reference, whatever you decide to do is fine with me, children wise. If you feel it's better not to tell Alex now, I'll understand. I'm sorry, Val, for imposing my opinions." Valerie looked up into his steel-lined aqua eyes. She leaned against him, and moved off the desk.

"Apology accepted. And for the record, I would never repeat Alice. I would never keep you from your grandchildren, Dad. I might want to, but I never could. I'm sorry." They shared a telepathic sense for when conversations reached an end. With a brief embrace, he began helping her to the main floor.

Once reaching her desk, Alex had moved towards the couch, now skimming a magazine with little interest.

"Val, babe, meds on your keyboard. Take them all now, dearie. You can thank me later tonight for being such an attentive lover." She gave her spouse a light huff of frustration before taking the cup of pills into her hand. Looking behind to see if Alex was paying attention and giving Jack a final glare she hid them in her sleeve. It was understood between father and daughter. Birth control and antibiotics just don't mix.

The door siren bubbled with excitement as Gwen rushed through the haze of steam. She seemed a bit frustrated, trying to zip her boots mid-stride. Heaving her duffle bag onto her chair, she blew her bangs back coarsely.

"Bloody hell, is Anwen doesn't start getting herself up for school, I'm going to make her start taking the bus! Morning, love. Heard you had bit of a rumble this morning, feeling better?" Gwen quickly questioned. Valerie stretched the muscles in her neck.

"Morning Gwen. Uh, yeah, much better. Dad stitched me and Alex medicated me so, ready to fight the good fight in about...oh, three days." Gwen chuckled knowingly, brushing a soft hand across her shoulders.

"Don't be fretting about that, I've been doing this long enough to patrol on my own. Now, where's that father of yours?"

"He was just here, I'd say he's sulked back to his office or the archives again. I don't know why he's so hung up on an empty storage room. I mean, I know why but…" Valerie tried to skirt around the name. Ever since she'd taken on the hassle of filing away the few parcels of information, reorganizing Torchwood's paper trail, Jack had been deflecting imperative questions. She one day managed the staggeringly cruel question of if she carried a pocket watch and wore a suit, would The Captain pay attention to her demands. It was the last time anything relating to the topic was brought up in front of Jack. Gwen placed her hands of her hips, a little low of spirits.

"Valerie, darling, he just misses Ianto. Ianto ran this place, you know. Jack's just used to a man's touch…"

"In more ways than one," Alex quipped. Gwen gave him a disapproving look.

"Quiet you. Give the old man a little respect, it's all he's got left to show. Just try to handle all the papers you can, eh? Ask me if you have any questions, Ianto did once attempt to teach me his system. Then he threw me out for knocking cola all over the extraterrestrial sexual inquiries. Kept him and Jack up for days, if I remember. Did them a favor in the long run." Gwen gave a flirtatious wink, still managing to be adorably cheeky in middle age. Valerie laughed heartedly, then flicked her fingers over the keyboard.

Bringing the Torchwood icon to life, Valerie quickly entered her password. Her profile snapped to life, along with the frustrating lines of recovery she'd been trying to pull from the memory of the hard drive. It had driven her insane at night, trying to uncover whatever was sleeping underneath the surface of Toshiko Sato's security system. Tapping her pen against the monitor, Valerie stared intently at the screen.

"Alex, I know there's something here. Are you sure your cousin can't stop by and take a look at it?"

"Val, he's seventeen and plays Warcraft."

"Yeah, well, his summer job was working for Geek Squad." Moving to her side, Alex ruffled her hair.

"You know, when you said we were packing up our life and moving to Cardiff to start an incredibly rewarding and dangerous job, my mind never wandered to all the hours we would spend sitting at this desk watching my wife cry over imaginary files."

"To be fair I did inform you about this while having sex," Valerie snickered. Alex leaned in close to her ear, the tips of his fingers making spirals along the base of her neck.

"You are very convincing, Valerie Keeper. Very indeed. But you know something? I've not regretted a minute of it." Spinning her chair, Valerie met Alex's stomach. She forced her hands underneath his shirt, clawing their way up his torso, climbing his limbs. Face to face, he lifted her onto the smooth glass of the table, her thighs pressing against the keyboard. Neither cared, it was intentionally messy. They wanted to explore their spaces, always finding smaller ways within the other's crevices to love. They touched. They felt hope. Slowly, Alex keyed his fingers through Valerie's jeans. He played with the delicate cotton of her panties, still feeling the innocent maneuvers from their childhood fondling. Their tongues matched in an open canopy of breath. Valerie moaned.

And then the beeping sounded. Annoyed, but desiring, Valerie turned to see what commotion was. From the computer a flood of hazel colors filled the screen.

"Wha- Alex, move. Move, move, move, move. Look! This is…this is it." Alex unhinged his waist from between her knees. Growling heavily he looked at the screen, he noticed a message.

_ARCHIVAL RECOVERY: PLEASE ENTER DATA_

"Is that it? Seriously? We just needed foreplay to activate the files? Bet that pisses you off…"

"ALEX! Go get Dad, this is amazing! Do you know what this means? This could hold all of the missing information from the explosion. This is everything. This is…this is completion. This is…this is blackmail on my father! Oh Christ, what is the data entry?" Valerie furiously tore through every password she could think of. Jack came racing from storage, taking position at Valerie's side. Alex, unimpressed by the discovery, flopped onto the sofa and mentally continued their interrupted sexual plays.

"Dad, what other password could be entered in for this? I've tried everything you gave me from Toshiko's notes and yours." Jack stretched his arms above his head.

"I don't know. Did you try Boeshane?"

"Actually, yes, but nothing cleared. This is hopeless."

"There's got to be a way to override this." Valerie gave Jack an ignorant stare.

"Really, Jack? You think Toshiko spent a year developing the most secure hardware in the history of, I don't know, everything only to have some bitty with two years in a public university break the code?" Mulling it over, Jack joined Alex on the couch. Valerie was crushed. Everything she could possibly need to piece back the missing pieces of Torchwood's history was encrypted into one, small phrase. Feeling very weary and in need of a drink, her head hit rested on the scanner lid. Frustrated tears began making their way down her nose. It was for nothing. What would she do to kill time around the Hub now? Eat Taco Bell and watch _MASH_ on the broken television?

But then the screen changed. Jack saw it first, pushing Alex over with a gruff punch.

"OW! Piss of, Jack."

"Shut and look at Valerie." Raising her head, alarmed, she saw what the boys were marveling over.

_PROCESSING DATA ENTRY…PROCESSING DATA ENTRY_…

"Oh God…" She wiped her face clear of sadness.

_PROCESSING DATA ENTRY…_

_DATA NOT CLEARED._

_AUTHORIZATION DENIED…_

_ARCHIVAL RECOVERY: PLEASE ENTER DATA_

"Well shit, good job Jackie-O, looks like you got everyone's hopes up," sneered Alex. Turning to face him with a fake punch, Valerie allowed the men to fight. Something brilliant had just happened, despite the daunting conclusion. Within those few flickers of procession, she had discovered the key to entering the files.

"It's DNA. The computer needs DNA to authorize the recovery. It's—it's perfect." Jack clasped his hands together.

"Brilliant! But who's do we need?" Valerie stared at the blinking cursor before her. Alex gave them both looks of disapproval.

"Does it matter? No offense, Jack, but unless you've got some voodoo magic up your sleeve, the programmer bit the dust a while back. We have no blood samples left of anyone before 2011 in the freezer. It's useless."

"No," Valerie stated. She noticed a small "i" flashing in the lower left corner of the screen. She'd seen the signature several places, most notably on the inside of her father's coat lining.

"It's him. I should've seen this, it was always him," Valerie turned to Alex, "He knew everything about these papers. He scanned them in. Toshiko set up the proper channels, but Ianto…" Jack's head snapped.

"Ianto? My Ianto?" Valerie gave him a small nod.

"Ianto Jones designed this system. He's the Data Entry. We need Ianto Jone's DNA, but more than that. This system, I've seen something similar to it before at UNIT. It's not just requiring blood or hair, not even tissue. It's calling for live DNA, fresh and oxygenated. Look, that's Ianto's signature at the bottom. He's left space for more names; he must've meant to add Dad and Gwen to it later. We need Ianto Jones alive."

Clattering pans echoed through the room. Valerie sharply turned to the noise to see Jack tossing the medicine cart across the room. Sliding down the cryogenic cells, her father rested.

"Ianto is dead. Shut this down, Valerie. Shut it down now."

"Dad, I—"

"NOW. That's an order." And with that, he stormed passed Alex and Val, grabbing his great coat swiftly. Jack headed out, towards the bay they both knew. Alex grabbed his partner's hand, rolling her fingers over his thumb.

"I'm sorry, babe." Valerie sat silent for a long time, it seemed. She stared at the flashing beckon from the monitor.

_PLEASE ENTER DATA_

"Don't be," she stated, "I have a plan." She searched her husband's eyes for compliance, and he of course relented.

"Alex, I'm bringing Ianto back." Alex admitted questionable fear.

"And um, how do you plan to do that, my sweet little necromancer?" Valerie leaned in close and kissed his spaced lips.

"I need to borrow your body, my darling husband."

And with that, he fainted.


	3. Repulsive

The temperature had dropped in the Hub. Steam began pouring off the top of the coffee pot, rolling itself across the room. The emptiness of the holed out office was made perfectly clear by the only two (living) bodies stretched out on the couch. Piled underneath mothballed flannel, Alex and Valerie tangled their limbs together. It was rare they received moments alone at Torchwood, especially since Jack had taken his upper office as an apartment. However, just for the night, Jack had decided to leave his daughter in charge. Still sore over Valerie's suggestion to reincarnate his former lover a couple days earlier, Jack wasn't sure if his rare absence from the base was due to frustration or duty. Either way, Alex was relieved from patrol for the evening.

Running a coarse hand over the back of her thigh, Alex rummaged through the covers only to remove Valerie's soft denim trousers. With a smile like worn leather, she maneuvered herself on top of him, the flanks of her long, pencil-dust hair tenting their faces. Cocooned together, she placed a soft kiss on the thick stubble of his chin.

"You need to shave." She grimaced. Groping through the delicate lining of her underwear, his fingers brushed her dark mound.

"Funny, I was going to tell you the same thing," Alex smirked. Throwing herself off of him, Valerie's bare feet startled at the introduction to the cold concrete.

"You're so goddamn disgusting! Why did I marry you?" Rising himself, Alex slipped his shirt off and tiptoed behind her. Meeting Valerie's hands at the edge of the railing towards the med bay, his middle finger flicked her wedding rings.

"Because when we were five, I told you I liked your cookies. You said you'd marry me then. And I believed you, all the way up till the actual day of our wedding. I figured you'd leave me behind, standing all awkward in a suit and top hat."

"That's what you get for trying to jerk of to 'Runaway Bride.'" Producing a bellied laugh, Alex nodded.

"I suppose, but if it helps, I've never forgotten that you're too good for me. Ever." He nuzzled her spine, a move that made her suddenly nervous. Despite their grotesque bickering, she hadn't forgotten the plan.

After begging him a couple more times, Alex relented to at least allowing her to try and use his body as a host for the deceased Ianto Jones's DNA. While the science was shaky, Valerie had witnessed a similar procedure performed in the states with rats. These scrambled scientists were lacking the advanced technology the HUB stored, giving her a bit of a confidence boost. Valerie wanted to appear confident to Alex, even going as far as nicknaming him Piggy, as in guinea pig. The tension of waiting for her father to leave that afternoon was nauseating. And yet at the moment they were alone, and Val knew it was now or never.

"Well, my Piggy, are you ready to get things started?" Alex grumbled and raced towards the bay, placing himself on the edge of the examination table. Valerie removed a steel cylinder from the freezer, one she had been hiding from her father for a couple days. Inside was a handkerchief she'd seen Jack ponder over several times. The delicate embroidery of the stitching, _IJ_, gave her hope that somewhere in those fibers was the tiniest piece of the former archivist left. Quickly, Valerie drained the liquid off the tissue into a basin. Alex cringed at the apparent lack of sanitation on his wife's part, just hoping his body's immune system wouldn't turn completely chaotic. Filling a syringe with the now buttercup colored serum, she motioned for Alex to stretch out his left arm. Placing the tourniquet tightly around his bicep, Valerie gave him one last glance.

"You really aren't doing this to prove some sort of bravery, are you?"

"Val, babe, I don't have a brave splinter of bone in my body. This is loyalty. No, trust. I trust you to not purposefully kill me, and if you do, to not use my life insurance for plastic surgery." Valerie gave him a somber stare.

"No jokes, Alex. Are you sure about this?" His right palm cupped her hands, moving the needle to the pulsing vain of his tightened arm.

"You can do this, brilliant girl. I'm positive. Now, hurry up." Nodding once, Valerie wasted no time. Gently, she slid the hay thin needle into his vein. Feeling the pop of flesh over the tip, she rhythmically applied pressure to the plunger. Alex didn't seem distressed, just watched carefully and applied a cotton ball over his wound as she removed the tip. Bringing his left arm up in a crunch, Alex sighed.

"So when am I supposed to change? And how, we never really covered the how." Valerie moved back towards him, resting her palms on his knees.

"I'm not exactly for sure of anything. With the rats, it was instantaneous, a complete physiological reprogramming. But the scientist used a different formula to make the genes mutate. I kinda Martha-Stewarted the whole thing. Bit of this, bit of that, but all with the same intention of rewriting your genetic code. Are you not in any discomfort?" Alex yawned loudly and laid back on the cold table.

"Discomfort, no. Bit miffed that you just decided to make me a genetic cocktail out of scratch, maybe. So, avoiding the question of what alien technology you used, I feel fine. I'm just going to assume since I'm larger than a rat…"

"It should take more time for you to mutate. But I'm not for sure how you'll look. I'm hoping from the dosage you'll stay the same, just give out a different blood type, but worse case scenario is…"

"I look exactly like Ianto Jones. Poor soul, I don't like the idea of taking a dead man's belongings." Valerie nodded, stretching her neck.

"Well, the good news is it's temporary. If it works at all, it'll be over within the next week or so. Bad news, we'll be hiding you from my Dad for that long. And he'll wonder how I got into the records without disobeying his orders." Looking at one another, Alex rolled off the table and hoisted an arm over Valerie's shoulders.

"I think, my dear wife, after all I've done for you tonight, the least you can do in return is show me a good time." Before she could protest, his hand cupped between her legs, still desperately trying to break through the last remaining barrier to nudity, those damn cotton panties. Making her eyes purr, Valerie leaned in to his grip.

"Fine, but not here. I refuse to be sexually repulsive outside of my own bedroom." Nodding enthusiastically, Alex tugged on his shirt, tossing Valerie's jeans rather reluctantly back to her.

"I hope you know when we get home, Val, those pants don't stand a chance in hell against me."

"What a charming, southern gentleman you are."


End file.
